Method for handling brick and delivering the same for use or storage.



R. U. PENFIELD. METHOD FOR HANDLING BRICK AND DELIVERING THE SAME FOB. USE 0E. STORAGE.

APPLICATION FILED SEPT. 15, 1908.

Patented June 14,1910.

TAN

zoF(zmou zmno EEQ BY A A7TORNEY UNITED STATES Pagans? oFF oE.

RAYMOND G. PENFIELD, OF NEW YORK, N. Y.

METHOD FOR HANDLING BRICK A ND DELIVERING THE SAME FOR USE CIR-STORAGE.

To all whom 'it may concern:

Be it known that I, RAYMOND C. PEN- FIELD, a citizen of the United- States of America, residing at the borough of Manhattan, in the county of New York and then delivering them for use or storage.

Before proceeding to definitely point out wherein my present invention conslsts, it is convenient to remark briefly upon certain general facts of brick manufacture to assist in more clearly understanding the problem my invention aims to solve. The details of the manufacture of bricks vary greatly according to their kind, the purpose for which,

they are used, and the material out of which they are made. There are three principal well known processes of manufacture, namely, soft mud, stiff mud, and dry press. Soft mud, or sand molded brick,

.,.are so called because the clay out of' which they are made is worked up in a very soft state. .This clay is formed into bricks either by being pressed by machinery or by .be-

ing thrown by hand into a wooden mold which, after being dampened by water, is sanded so that the clay, after being formed into bricks, can readily be dumped out upon the yard to dry, or upon a pallet in drying racks or otherwise placed in a drier. These bricks when thus molded are too soft to be handled by hand, or to bearthe weight of one brick u on another, but must remain upon the pa let or in the yard until sulficiently dry to be taken to the kiln. If dried on pallets, or if dried on an open yard to be edged up andlater hacked u in hacks ten to twelve or morev high, the rying will be completed in this way to make the bricks ready for transfer to the kiln for burning. This method of brick-making is the oldest, and until the invention of machinery the molding was performed entirely by hand with a wooden mold. Stiff mud, or wire cut brick, are so called because the clay is worked much stifi'er than in the case of soft mud brick, and is expressed through a die in a continuous bar which is cut, up into brick size by means of cut-01f wires. Bricks Specification ot'Letters Patent. Patentd June 14 1910. Application filed September 15, 1908. Serial no. 458,178.

made in this manner can be immediately hacked up from five to-eight or ten' high for drying, and can be putin hackson a yard or .in a drier or in a kiln for .finishing the drying process. plastic brick, are made from clay which is Dry press brick, or semi-- sufficiently dry to be pulverized. After pulverization it is compressed under exceedingly high which the brick comes out hard enough to be at once placedin the kiln and hacked upas high as maybe desired. Soft mud brick are made almost exclusively in the eastern part of the United States, especially along the Hudson river, the clay in that locality being adapted to this particular kind of manufacture. Stiff mud and dry press brick are largely manufactured in the west, since the clays there are much better adapted to these methods of making brick.

With all three of these processes of manufacture, the operations subsequent .to the drying of the brick are essentially thesame. The

bricks are-set in the kiln, burned, and then 'to the-market; with facemr fire brick they are usually sorted and placed in storage sheds in readiness for shipment as required.

Obviously the bricks go through a great variety of handlings and processes, accord ing to the type of manufacture employed, up to the time of com' to the kiln to be set. And in thecase of all kinds of brick and of all processes, the same laborious and expensive system of handling each brick separately over and over by hand in all the various stages of manufacture has heretofore been employed. They are set by hand in the kiln, being stacked in loose or open formation to permit the heat to circulate freely throughout the kiln, and to give sufficient draft to conduct the burning process. After the brick have been burned in the kiln they are removed therefrom by hand, being placed upon a wheel-barrow, a small car, or according to some more recent cases, upon a conveyer belt or on a gravity conveyer for removing the brick from the kiln to the cars or to a storage yard. The brick are then stacked or piled up in close or shipping formation; that is to say, the bricks instead of being piled in open or loose formation as in the burning process are packed tightly together in mmediate contact with .'each close or shipping formation is to economize s ace and to better protect the brick from amage in shipment. 'In thus briefly summarizing the methods of handling heretofore employed, I do not lose sight of the fact that efforts have been made by a few to substltute a handling of the bricks in bulk for the individual handlin I have described. Neither do I overloo the patent of J. P. B. F iske, No. 633,955, September 26, 1899, and that of William Henry Francis, No. 87 582, December 24, 1907, but my present invention while it may include to some extent what these patentees have done, is a distinct improvement thereon and an extension thereof of a very beneficial character.

My invention aims to simplify the old and well-known method and apparatus of handling bricks in the course of manufacture and delivery, as well as to improve upon the inventions described in the patents mentioned, by avoiding the multiplied manual operations now performed with each brick, and substitute therefor certain specified mechanical handlings of the brick in bulk or in formations which can be adhered to throughout various steps, so that each individual brick will not be repeatedly handled over and over again, and so that the bulk or quantity manipulations may be continued on a much wider scale and for a longer time than has heretofore been attempted by an one who has tried to use the bulk han lings. In other words my object is to eliminate the frequent handling of the individual bricks either in their green or burned condition.

Throughout my method I sometimes utilize an aggroupment of the bricks in open or burning formation and sometimes one in close or shipping formation, all as will be fully pointed out. The open or burning for! mation may built by hand in the kiln or by stacks that are moved into the kiln from a point outside. Hence the invention may be said sometimes to consist in providing means for taking the molded clay or green bricks as they issue from the brickmaking machine and building the same into unit stacks'of definite dimensions and formation, the said formation being open for burning purposes, and thereafter maintaining these unit stacks intact either as so many separate stacks or else in masses made up of a multiplicity of these stacks until the bricks are burned. But this is only one form that the invention may take, however, for the bricks may be set in the kiln in a different way. Then, after burning, the brick which has thus been in open or burning formation is rearranged in new unit stacks by a resetting thereof in close or shipping formation, where they are all in contact closely at the sides so as to occup as small a space as possible, and these umt stacks of close or shipping formation are maintained either as so many separate unit stacks or else in masses made of a multiplicity of these unit stacks, throughout the additional processes of the manufacture and of the delivery of the bricks from the kiln to the place of storage or the place of shipment or even to the structure where they are to be used. And the invention also consists in various details and peculiarities in the steps of the method and in the apparatus substantially as will be hereinafter described and claimed.

In the accompanying drawings illustrating my invention, Figure 1 is a diagrammatic plan view of a brick yard, kiln, storage and delivery points, with other appurtenances, for the manufacture and delivery of bricks, the same being shown in a conventional manner for the purpose of indicating how my improved method is carried out. Fig. 2 1s a side elevation of a stack of bricks arranged in open formation. Fig. 3 is a side elevation of a stack of bricks arranged in close formation.

Like letters of reference designate like parts throughout the different figures of the drawing. I

A designates a brick-making or molding machine of any desired kind. The bricks made by this machine are piled upon a car B running from the machine on a track I). The track I) connects with a cross track 0 on which travel transfer cars C which are adapted to receive the cars B from the track b. The track 0 runs alongside of a drier D and branch tracks d lead into and through the drier D from the track 0. Thus it will be seen that the cars B which receive the green brick are transferred by the transfer cars C to the tracks at and thus delivered to the drier. Further, these cars D emerge from the drier at the other side and may be delivered by transfer cars E running on a track e to a kiln Gr.

The piling of the green bricks, after they issue from the brick machine A, upon the car B is in open formation similar to that shown in Fig. 2, consisting of as many bricks as it may bedesired to pile in one stack, or as the stack is convenientlycalled, a unit. This unit is designed to remain intact while being carried through the drier and into the kiln and until the burning operation is finished, after which, in accordance with the principles of my present invention, the bricks are to be re-set in a different formation. These unit stacks of open formation may be delivered individually through the drier and into the kiln by suitable lifting and transferring mechanism consisting of traveling cranes, etc.

One example of mechanism for lifting bricks in the stack formation from the station outside the kiln into the kiln is shown and described in the aforesaid Fiske Patent No. 633,955, but obviously any mechanism .mation in unit stacks that will perform the lifting and transferring function and will transport the stack mation will serve as well as the peculiar ipparatns set forth in the Fiske patent. echanism like that shown and described in the patent of William Henry Francis, No. 859,445, dated July 9, 1907, will serve to grip and firmly hold a pile of bricks for conveying them from one place to another, and I therefore instance that as another form of mechanism that may be utilized. Also, the useful method found in the patent of William Henry Francis, No. 874,582, dated December 24, 1907, may be employed in said method. The lifting strain is applied at a point below the center of gravity of the bulk, but above the basic layer of the material, while at the same time the basic layer is lifted by a pinching strain ap lied below the plane of application of the li ting strain and at right angles to the same, but above the basic surface of the mass. Of'course, whatever may be the instrumentality made use of to transport the bricks from a station outside of the kiln to the interior of the kiln, or from the brick machine through the drier and then on into the kiln, it must always/be understood that the supporting means will be readily removable from supporting engagement with the bricks without disturbing the stack formation of the bricks.

After the bricks have been set in open foror a plurality of unit stacks in the kiln, the bricks are burned and after the burning 1s completed, it becomes necessary to remove the bricks as quickly as possible so that another lot for burnin may be introduced. Now as soon as the ricks are thus ready to be removed from the kiln, my invention contemplates an immediate restackin -of the bricks in unit stacks, or a multiplicity of unit stacks, in close formation so that they may be shipped easily. When they have been thusrestacked they can, by any suitable means, as, for instance, the means shown in the patents already referred to, be lifted and transported. The bottom course of the close formation of bricks has its members spaced apart to receive rods, fingers, or other lifting and. trans porting devices, which may be placed under the stack for 'the purpose of lifting it. This bottom course having openings therein is shown in Fig. 2 at the base of the stack of close formation at H. Outside of the kiln G is a station I on which is placed the unit stacks in close formation made up of the bricks that have been burned in the kiln, and

in connection with the bricks at the station I may be employed mechanisms of the patents already referred to, or any other suitv of the bottom ayers of the c able for the purpose, which mechanisms as I have said are a plied in the o n-work base ose formation stacks, and this mechanism whenv it transports the bricks is readily removable from its supporting engagement with the bricks without disturbin their stack formation.

The bricks in tie form of unit stacks of close formation can be loaded from the station I onto cars J or upon delivery wagons, and can thereby point as K, orto a boat or train as L. Whatever carrying means may be employed, and

ported, they can be kept in the stack formation and delivered from one point to another, suitable lifting and moving appliances being employed in each instance, so that in a word it may be said that after the bricks are put into-the close or shipping for .mation and removed fromthe kiln, they can be handled in units cheaply to the cars, to the dock for storage, or to barges to go from yard to market, from the barge to the storage yard, or to the wagon to be delivered to the building, or from the wagon at the building the brick in unit stacks may be lifted from the wagon and hauled to the place of stora e, or to. the scaffold to be laid in. the Wa 1. There is thus to be disbe. carried to a storagehowever far the unit stacks may be transtingnished very clearly the original piling of the bricks in one formation, which is loose and open to ermit burning, and may be referred to as oose formation, which is clearly shown in Fig. 2, and that other mode of piling the bricks for purposes of transportation and shipment, which is not loose and open, but is close, the bricks being put closely and snugly against each other so as to occupy as little space as possible, which formation may formation and is depicted in Fig. 3. y In the case of the shippin stated, one row of bricks at the bottom is left open or loose, in order that devices ma be employed underneath the stack to lifl the latter. In the process of manipulating bricks in the course of manufacture, etc., units of loose formation will be utilized in the kiln and in the steps leading to the kiln, it being essential that the bricks should be in this position when they are bein so that there may be plenty of air draft between them. When the bricks, however, are removed from the kiln, say individually by hand or by the bodily transfer of the units or stacks, it will be found most desirable to re-stack them in shipping formation of the close kind just mentioned, so that they may be transported to wagons, cars or other means for carrying them, and in order that, they may be handled effectively a great number of times it is best that they should continue to occupy the units built according to close or shipping formation. That is to formation, as already burned bricks in boxes at the say, the burned bricks are put in close vor shipping formation, as indicated in Fig. 3, and are then taken away from thekiln in an desired manner.

Efi'ortshave been made from time to time to reduce-the costof handling by placing kiln, then placing boxes on cars, or barges, handling same with a; crane, then handling same to the buildin etc. None have been commercially SUCOGSSEJI, as the expense of equipment, and cost, and inconvenience of transporting it i and returning to factory have more than offset the saving.

By m improved system it will be ossible to andle the brick from kiln to building without dificulty and with greater economy. Moreover by restacking I make it possible to remove defective brick, poorly urned brick, and to place the brick in the best possible shape for shi ment, and also to sort them properly, an the subsequent handling necessary to get them to market,

so that the feature of restacking becomes important and useful, insteadof being objectionable in any way.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim as new and desire to secure by Let,- ters Patent, is:

1. The herein described method of manufacturing bricks, which consists in placing the bricks in unit stacks in open formation suitable for the burning process, carrying said stacks into burning position andire- ;br1cks in close or shippi lifting and trans transporting the in presence 0 moving the supporting means from support- .ing engagement with the bricks without disturbing their said stack formation, subjecting said bricks to heat, then restacking the the bottom portion space apart to receive ortlng means, lifting and ricks while the lower portion is still spaced apart and the superposed bricks are stlll in said close formatlon, and then removing the carrying means without disturbing the mutual relation of the bricks.

2. The herein described method of manufacturing and delivering bricks, which condisturbing the mutual relation of the bricks.

In tetsimonfy whereof I afix my signature two witnesses.

RAYMOND C. PENFIELD.

I Witnesses:

FRANK PAUL, C. B. Sermononn.

formation with 

